


Vernal Equinox

by RenderedReversed



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, I'm Sorry, Implied Relationships, M/M, Powerful Harry, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Vigilantism, dark superhero au, still trying to cover all my bases
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-12
Updated: 2016-04-12
Packaged: 2018-06-01 19:37:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6533671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RenderedReversed/pseuds/RenderedReversed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because ‘Tom Riddle’ is scrawled across his forehead, because ‘Harry Potter’ is a scar upon his, because no bandages or fabric or masks can hide the beckoning of a soulmate—Harry knows. Heartless, merciless, ruthless Voldemort is the soulmate of the Boy-Who-Lived, and nothing will save him now.</p><p>But he still dons the mask and still dons the clothes. If he’s going to die, he’ll die a Death Eater and haunt them, reborn in their very own phoenix ashes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vernal Equinox

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Zenithyl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zenithyl/gifts).



Life is a funny thing. When Harry was little, when he could still remember the warm arms of his mother and the timber of his father’s voice, happiness meant every day and every hour and every minute while sadness was the seconds of scraping his knees or breaking a toy.

He didn’t know what ‘hungry’ was until lunch or dinner or snack time, and the only time he heard the word ‘poor’ was when the rain came down and his mother hummed, “ _It’s raining, it’s pouring, the old man is snoring…”_

‘Money’ was a mysterious, important word that was an adult’s secret, and whether it was whispered behind closed doors or casually at the grocery store, Harry never bothered to listen. But the arms of his mother are gone and the voice of his father is a fading memory now, and he understands the words ‘starvation’ and ‘poverty’ and ‘greed.’ They are intangible things, things he can’t feel beneath his finger tips or wash in the dish washer, but at the same time he knows them as if they are the creases on the palms of his hands.

There are people in this world who are not good. ‘Evil’ is too strong a word—reserved for fictional antagonists in fairytales—but they are not just or fair or kind. They do villainous things for murky reasons, commit crimes to the detriment of society for a taste of hope, believe in justice and karma because they believe in their own righteousness. They are not _good_ , but few people are.

People can do good things; people can do bad things. People can cry and laugh and give and share, but they can hurt and steal and anger and claim. Life is a funny thing because the older one is, the poorer one’s vision is and the more the eyes have to see. There’s a choice to make—always, there’s a choice.

Harry’s made his.

He abandons happiness for justice. They are not mutually exclusive things, but they are not synonymous either. Happiness is absolution and justice always has a loser.

He hides the name beneath concealer and bandages. He has as many beanies as there are socks in his drawers—anything can go wrong at any time, but Harry knows how to stall. The tiny fingers that used to trace along the cursive loops and dips of his mark are grown now, and the skin lies hidden most days and untouched for the rest. His happiness for a hundred others’. Harry will make that trade any day— _has_ made that trade _every_ day.

The world needs a hero. The world needs hero _es_. People who will fight for the unable, who will speak out for the oppressed. People need other people who will fight against those who aren’t good, who _won’t_ be good, and that’s where the Death Eaters come in.

They are his home now. They are his family. Bonded by sweat and blood and tears, they swear upon their soul to defeat every villain, every man or woman that grasps for pleasure by ascending a stairway of bodies. It is honest vigilantism, ironically—behind their bright masks and dark clothes, they will lie lie lie until their very identities are unrecognizable.

Well, _should be_ unrecognizable, as Harry finds out. Voldemort stares at him across the sea of orange and bleeding red, face a shade of death and figure the grim reaper himself. The Death Eaters have power. For the same reason, the government would see them dead.

“ _Run_ ,” Hermione breathes into his ear.

“ _Go_ ,” Harry says instead.

 A strong hand grabs at his arm but he is stone. “You can’t do this yourself!” Ron shouts. “You can’t do this _to_ yourself!”

“Not for me,” Harry says. “For you. For everyone. I’ll bring him down with me—I’m the only one who can.”

He doesn’t hesitate to say it. They know the name carved into his forehead, a birthmark tying two souls. It isn’t a matter of pride or dignity or selflessness—it is honest truth; fact a hated, unwanted thing just as the rest of nature’s savagery is. The Order of the Phoenix will not stop until the Death Eaters are caught, bound, and ‘tried’ for their sins, but it will be a bastardized justice at best, because the government is scared and the world is wanting.

“They’re coming,” Ginny whispers away from the light of sunset. At dusk they will strike. In the morning they will rise victorious, like a phoenix reborn from the ashes of their enemies.

But the Death Eaters are not so easy.

“ _Go_ ,” Harry says again. “If we’re surrounded, it’s over. They don’t know how many of us are here—just that _I’m_ here. He’ll want me first anyway. He’s an asshole like that.”

Ron mutters something under his breath like, “Hell hath no fury like a Voldemort scorned—” Hermione elbows him in the ribs where her name is undoubtedly tattooed beneath the clothes, just as his is on hers. They’re a crumpled up ball of nerves and stress, but Harry laughs anyway because his friend has a point.

Tom is— _is_. Harry can’t hate him and refuses to love him either, so apparently this is where it leaves them: caught up in some cat and mouse game, hero and not-hero, vigilante and vigilante _hunter…_ The line is so blurred that he’s surprised it’s even still there. Harry can’t tell who is who and he doubts the mate to his soul can either.

“I think he wants to rip your guts out, Ron,” Harry says like an offhanded comment about the weather. But if the weather is Voldemort’s mood and the forecast is tonight’s ambush, then it’s accurate enough. Ron drops his arm like he touched a hot iron and Harry really doesn’t blame him. Voldemort _would_ rip someone’s guts out, and the odds of it being Ron only increases by every second he’s still touching Harry.

“Why does he have to have such freakishly good eyesight?”

“Because _I_ have ‘freakishly good eyesight.’ Hear it comes from my dad. Eyes are supposed to be mum’s though, so don’t know.”

“Shouldn’t you be coming up with a plan instead of making eyes at each other?” Ginny moans from her spot in the shadows. “Fred and George are on their way. So’s Sirius and Remus, but that’s a two-hour trip and I hear Voldemort’s not the nicest guy in the world to wait for us.”

“Who’s your source?”

It’s a rhetorical question. Ginny bites back with a, “He’s a pretty reliable guy, being his soulmate and all.”

Harry decides that’s enough tomfoolery. “You all need to go,” he says. “Leave. Run. Hide. Get out of town and meet back at the base. As long as _I_ don’t move from where _I_ am, _he_ won’t move either—and you can handle a few roasted chickens while you make a great escape.”

“We’re _not_ leaving you.” Not for the first time, Hermione embodies the entirety of everyone’s opinions in one sentence.

Harry shoots it down with his own. “ _Yes_ , you are.”

“Harry—”

“If it was anyone else he would’ve gone in and chopped off all our heads _yesterday_. At the same time, if it was anyone else, he wouldn’t have even known we were here.” Harry recites it all with a calm he doesn’t feel. That’s okay though—he gave up happiness, a little more of his emotions is not so big of a deal. “I’ve quite liked my life. It wasn’t the greatest, but it wasn’t the worst either. I’d do it again if I had the choice.”

There’s always a choice.

“…Should I get a pen and paper? If this is your will then I don’t trust my memory to—”

“ _Ron!_ Harry’s not going to die! And Harry, stop talking like you’re going to die!”

“I’m not going down without a fight,” he continues. “I’ll bring him down with me. He’s their strongest—the Order can’t hunt us down without him. And then…”

“Romantic dinner at a table for two in Hell?”

Harry laughs. “He’d like that. We never finished our last meal before we…”

Hermione reaches for him. Possessive bastard across the skyline be damned. “It’ll be alright, Harry,” she swears like her hand’s on top of the Bible, “We’ll get out of this. You won’t be alone.”

“No,” he says, slow and steady, “I won’t. I’ll be with Tom. And _you all_ will hopefully be halfway across town before any fighting even goes down, so _go_.”

Ginny snaps. “Stop talking like we’re actually going to listen! Fred and George are almost here and—”

And. She doesn’t finish, because she can’t. There’s nothing left to say. What can they do when Voldemort’s brought his best with him? When even Dumbledore—but no, Harry doesn’t tell them about that part, because then they would never leave for sure. The leader of the Order of the Phoenix being here means they have no intentions of letting Harry go alive. It’s an execution.

Harry takes Hermione’s hand and then Ron’s in another. Ginny’s frantic whispering on the phone is like static in his ears. He squeezes them tight and they squeeze back; one burst, another, and a third before they all let go. It reminds him of the time before their first fight against Madame Pince, the librarian gone mad.

He was such a mess, then. _They_ were such a mess. But that was then and this is now, so Harry says goodbye.

Ron sniffs. Hermione whimpers, a sob stuffed in the back of her throat. The Death Eaters are a family because they are familiar with sacrifices. None of them fear death for themselves—they fear for others, always others. Harry wants to kiss them both. Instead, his gaze never turns from the stare fixed to him through the window, and he hears them both pulling Ginny away and over to the door.

“What—what are you guys doing?! We aren’t going to _leave him here_! Ron! Hermione! Let me _go_ —”

He doesn’t know what makes him do it. When the sounds of their footsteps fade, Harry reaches up and lets the skull mask fall. It lands onto the concrete floor, clattering until it finds equilibrium in a coffin of bones. They are his. They will be his. His and Tom’s—equilibrium, that unobtainable state.

It is almost dusk. His hands lift, pushing away his bangs.

‘Tom Riddle’ is written like a brand across his forehead, and across the city, Harry can see as Voldemort lets his mask fall, too—‘Harry Potter’ a mess of red blood and marred skin. Soulmates.

“ _This is the police. We have the building surrounded. Come out with your hands up and_ —”

Sparks fly at his fingertips. If it’s a fight they’re looking for, the Boy-Who-Lived will give them one.

He always dreamed of being a superhero.

**Author's Note:**

> lol what
> 
> A really long time ago Zenithyl requested a villain!Harry and hero!TMR-LV fic, but since the one I have in progress is no where close to being done (and I am legitimately OBSESSED with Miraculous Ladybug holy hell my new OTP WOW it is only a matter of time before I write fanfiction for that), I figured this will stave off my guilt
> 
> Sorry for not fulfilling my promises of happiness and fluff
> 
> It's just
> 
> MIRACULOUS LADYBUG IS KILLING ME
> 
> SO IM BRINGING EVERYONE DOWN WITH ME
> 
> I'm hella sorry though :(


End file.
